Friday, November 24, 2006

Since we've been talking about prolificness, I thought I'd pass on what Gayle Lynds has to say on the subject. She has 5 youtube videos that show the best parts of a conference workshop she gave at the International Thriller Writers Conference. The first, I believe, talks about prolificness, and how a writer shouldn't feel pressured to produce more than they can. She's right. Whatever works ... as long as it works.

Oops, gotta sidetrack here for a second. I teach several adult students, and have been teaching many of the years. The number one problem we adults have, is that we try one method, and we stick by it because that's how we think we need to do it.

When that method fails, we adults tend to blame ourselves, rather than the method, for the failure. Instead of saying, "We should eat spaghetti with a fork, not a spoon," we say, "I'm just not good enough with the spoon to eat spaghetti. I'm a failure at eating."

We should never sell ourselves short like that. Chances are, if we change our approach enough times, we'll stumble upon what works.